The Walker With Heart

The morning suit is hung, the shoes polished to a high shine, the champers chilling in the fridge for the train down... The last 11 months have been about waving the congenital heart disease flag across the UK, whether for the Children's Heart Federation, GUCH PA, the GUCH Walking Club or just generally. Congenital Heart Defects have appeared in national magazines, local papers, across the internet , facebook and twitter. I promised way back that this would be an honest blog, and I've stuck to that. Those of you who've read each blog will know that its a year where people I've known have died, had operations, worried me silly and made me smile with their approach to living life. And that's what this has been about, me living my life... Yes, this year has been something special, pushing myself to new limits - the Edinburgh Marathon, the constant need to push through the miles. Getting to the top of Snowdon on a crystal clear day, the friends I've walked wi...

Hot, tired... yup... But as the photo belows shows I was quite happy shortly afterwards... So what did the Marathon teach me? Find a decent sweatproof sunscreen, trust my body and its training and the big thing for me is that I can follow a task orientated plan. My natural approach is to ride across the plains with sword waving and hope people are following me, to be able to buckle down and deliver gives me a bit more confidence in dealing with things in that structured way - and that's the plan when it comes to my ability to swim - find a task orientated session rather than the splash and dash I had before Xmas. The skin is flaking off, the aches and pains are fading, and do I want to do another one? Yes, but a cold one... Any ideas? TTFN Paul

The numbers tell a tale... 10k: 01:15:46 - Good Half: 00:00:00 - the watch says 2:46 - Good 30k: 04:05:07 - Fantaaaaasssssstic , last time I was out this far it was 4:45 ish Marathon: 05:53:49 - Holy cow I've just hit a hot exposed area on rough ground, slammed into a wall of heat, forgot how to run for a bit... I don't know if its normal but the further I got in the marathon the more my running regressed in time... 1st 10km good solid running, hell the first half good solid running (my PB for a half is only 8min faster), tried to stick to the game plan 2km run 500m walk... Then 30km came, and a huge exposed section of the run, rough ground that no one (based on the reviews) were expecting... I walked passed chicken sheds where the chickens were hiding in the barn rather than the heat... Fellow runners were in all sorts of states at the side of the route, and it would've been the easiest thing in the world to sit down and join them. But I didn't, if the last 1400-odd k...

I have a personal enemy... an 8ft tall giraffe ... for as long I can remember they've been doing the Great North Run... Normally starting well in front of me and trying to keep up as I go past... To be fair they're carrying a giraffe costume, but this is about passion not fairness... Anyway, the giraffe has moved west, and was in the Great Manchester 10k... and ate dust after about 1500m... Obviously they have no idea they've caused this competitive edge in me... The Dragon, I was trying to help - the tale and wrapped around last runners legs and she asked if I could pull it and get it clear... Unfortunately it sort of turned into a tourniquet come razor wire thing... Oppps :-( But a PB was run:-D and the 1400km has been bought up:-D Which leaves me 6 days to rest, relax, short run on Tuesday, and carbo -load... Train to Edinburgh on Saturday, and yes I am getting nervous! To finish with a question... For a final flourish, would you all join me (virtually or really...) ...

Its been a bad week in European GUCH circles, in fact its been a bad year... Too many of the people I've come to hold dear have died. This Game of Ghosts is the sequel to Touching the Void, where Joe Simpson moves on from mountaineering for a while to take up equally dangerous sports - like long distance hang-gliding... I first read it about after another period of time where GUCHs died in a cluster and the thought struck me that in sometimes the thought processes are the same, the need to get away from it all balanced by the need to be close to those we care about and can provide us with the support we need. The big difference is that I have no choice to do the GUCH thing, I'm not prone to wondering about alternate universes where I'm not one or how I'd be. Being a GUCH is a fact of my life, like having brown hair... Just a tad more annoying, inconvenient and dangerous. Some people ask why life is unfair, especially at times like this. Life is unfair, its unfair ...

Time moves on, the immediate pain subsides and become a dull ache, bit like tearing a muscle .. in this case my heart and the hearts of all of those who knew Charlie especially his wife, children and family. Time moves on, lives focus more on what could be than what we have lost... This week is Children's Heart Week, the Children's Heart Federation are coordinating events around the country, and a Teddy Bear Takeover at the East Midlands Designer Outlet , Mansfield Road, South Normanton , Derbyshire , DE55 2 JW . The outlet is here - http://www.mcarthurglen.com/locations/uk/east-midlands/index.htm The Children's Heart Federation can be found in the Food Court at the following times; Thursday 13 th May 2010 from 1pm-7pm with a children's colouring competition drawn betwee...

I promised to be honest , I don 't do much sugar coating ... to some I can appear cold as only those who can see deep in my soul see the pain , and that the coldness isn 't ice but the pure heat of plasma as my emotions are contained by my ability to put a magnetic field around them stonger than any at the large hadron collider ... A friend has died , a friend I saw yesterday , he wasn 't well but yesterday we nattered about gadgets , the finer points of GUCH PA and the walks we would do together when he 'd been let out . Charlie was the heart of the GUCH Walking Club, the one who always tried , was always ready to help out someone else even if he was tired himself . He was only one of the GWC who I could trust to wield the mighty spoon of stirring as he rustled up his variant of our infamous Bean Surprise ... Almost exactly a year ago we w...

Well, not often I've felt I've had to slow myself down, reminding myself that this was just meant to be a solid, long, slow run... And I still ran my 3rd fastest half marathon distance:-) What's really pleasing is that my legs felt good all the way through, I was able to vary my pace nicely, my drinking and fueling strategy worked and the new trainers and shorts worked like a dream... So now we taper down the runs, next weekend will be 10miles the one after that the Manchester 10km and inbetween nice 5km and 5 miles.... Including a possibly unusual approach to a 24h ECG tape... As I mentioned back in March my cardiologist wants a 24h tape done, mainly cos its been a while a long while... So the plan is go and get wired up, ask for extra strong tape, and then explain why... I'll be climbing after work on the Wednesday, which as well as the physical exertion has been known to worry some cardiologists as its static loading and stretching across my chest... Then after a w...